Friday, September 6, 2013

Sepia Saturday - Sep 7

193 : Girl in a rowing boat in the middle of nowhere. So there are four potential themes for starters : girl, boat, middle and nowhere.

I went through all our family photos and could not come up with anything for this topic. I remembered that in June we had attended the Tall Ships Festival at Queen's Quay and there had been a display of old photos depicting Toronto's waterfront. It is on until September 2.

Before 1917, Toronto Harbour often froze over. Torontonians used this wide stretch of ice for skating parties, hockey games, curling matches as well as the popular winter sport, ice yachting.

Archival photographs show Toronto Bay filled with the canvas sails of iceboats, the slender wooden vessels gliding over the ice on steel runners. Iceboat races and regattas were also common, often drawing huge crowds. They also had their practical uses, moving people and goods to the islands as there was no ferry service in the winter.

The relocation of the Western Gap in 1917 altered the currents in the bay resulting in less ice, so that by the 1920s it was no longer safe for winter sports.